LANCE COURTHORNE

It was late when Winston reached his log-built house, but he set out
once more with his remaining horse before the lingering daylight crept
out of the east to haul the wagon home. He also spent most of the day
in repairing it, because occupation of any kind that would keep him
from unpleasant reflections appeared advisable, and to allow anything
to fall out of use was distasteful to him, although as the wagon had
been built for two horses he had little hope of driving it again. It
was a bitter, gray day with a low, smoky sky, and seemed very long to
Winston, but evening came at last, and he was left with nothing between
him and his thoughts.

He lay in a dilapidated chair beside the stove, and the little bare
room through which its pipe ran was permeated with the smell of fresh
shavings, hot iron, and the fumes of indifferent tobacco. A
carpenter's bench ran along one end of it, and was now occupied by a
new wagon pole the man had fashioned out of a slender birch. A Marlin
rifle, an ax, and a big saw hung beneath the head of an antelope on the
wall above the bench, and all of them showed signs of use and glistened
with oil. Opposite to them a few shelves were filled with simple
crockery and cooking utensils, and these also shone spotlessly. There
was a pair of knee boots in one corner with a patch partly sewn on to
one of them, and the harness in another showed traces of careful
repair. A bookcase hung above them, and its somewhat tattered contents
indicated that the man who had chosen and evidently handled them
frequently, possessed tastes any one who did not know that country
would scarcely have expected to find in a prairie farmer. A table and
one or two rude chairs made by their owner's hands completed the
furniture, but while all hinted at poverty, it also suggested neatness,